The Girl Who Changed Little League: The True Story of Maria Pepe and Her Battle to Play Ball

Discover the true story of Maria Pepe, an eleven-year-old girl who changed the course of Little League history.

Maria Pepe loved baseball. When Little League formed in her hometown in 1972, she was eager to prove herself as a competitor. There was only one problem: Little League was not open to girl players. This didn't stop Maria. She took her glove and joined her friends, Nicky and Louie, at tryouts. She could hit, pitch, and catch as good as any of the boys--better than many, even, and it was no surprise that Maria made the team. Little did she know, she would make history when the Little League officials refused to let her play because she was a girl.

Highlighting resilience and bravery in the face of opposition, this powerful story details the true events that led to girls being able to play Little League--all told from Maria's first-person perspective as a young athlete.

Author: Maria Pepe,Jean L. S. Patrick
Publisher: Christy Ottaviano Books-Little Brown and Hach
Published: 03/03/2026
Pages: 48
Binding Type: Hardcover
Weight: 1.07lbs
Size: 11.16h x 9.82w x 0.45d
ISBN: 9780316464239
Audience: Ages 4-8


Review Citation(s):
School Library Journal 11/01/2025 pg. 107
Publishers Weekly 11/24/2025
Booklist 12/01/2025
Kirkus Reviews 01/01/2026

About the Author
Maria Pepe was one of the first girls to play Little League baseball after the organization officially banned girls in 1951. She played for three games before she was forced to quit the team. Playing sports and supporting girls and women in sports has been her adult life's work. She still lives in Hoboken, NJ, the city of her youth and in 2016 Hoboken dedicated the batting cages at the Little League field in her name. This is the first time she is publicly sharing her story in book form.

Jean L.S. Patrick is the author of The Girl Who Struck Out Babe Ruth and several other award-winning nonfiction books about women in sports for young readers, including most recently Long-Armed Ludy and the First Women's Olympics, illustrated by Adam Gustavson, a Junior Library Guild selection. Jean grew up in the Chicago area and spent countless hours on the bleachers, desperately wanting to play Little League baseball. Jean and Maria are the same age and Jean still remembers seeing a newspaper clipping about Maria Pepe and wishing that she could have been as brave. As she put it: "Maria has always been my hero." Jean works at her local library in South Dakota and has a robust schedule of school and teaching visits throughout the Dakotas and the Midwest.

Sarah Green is an illustrator and designer from San Francisco. She graduated from RISD in 2014 and now splits her time between her hometown of San Francisco and Vancouver, Canada, with her fluffy, tiny cat by her side. She loves history, research, and nature, and probably has more plants than a person should.